Waimea United Church of Christ

Luke 11:1-13“The 4 ‘P’s’”

When we
think about the bible, we should see that it makes a giant circle. At the very
beginning of the book in Genesis, we see that we are in close relationship with
God. Adam and Eve are in the Garden of Eden with God present with them. They
have regular conversations with God. God is heard just walking around there.
Genesis 3:8, “And they heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in
the cool of the day. . . .”

At the end
of the Bible, we are once again in the very presence of God. Revelation 22:4,
“They shall see his face, and his name shall be on their foreheads. And night
shall be no more; they need no light of the lamp or sun, for the Lord God will
be their light, and they shall reign for ever and ever.”

The rest of
the bible is the part that we are living in. We no longer hear His presence
walking in the cool of the day. WE do not yet see him face to face. We can look
back. We can look forward. This leads us to prayer: a desire deep in the fabric
of our being to want to be with God now—not just to remember when or to look
forward to a time. Prayer is predicated on the very sincere understanding that
we need God NOW in our lives. That is why we pray constantly—to feel God
immediately with us.

In our
scripture for today, Jesus is off by himself praying. He is being with His
Father in heaven. Like so often, Jesus becomes the victim of “oratio
interruptus,” the interrupted prayer. His followers also want to know how to be
with God in prayer as Jesus is in that moment. They ask him sincerely to teach
them how to pray.

I very much
believe that prayer is like an involuntary muscular action, that it is akin to
breathing or the heart pumping blood. I am not sure that we need to be taught
so much how to pray. It is in our very nature to speak with our Creator. For
example, when children are upset, they go lock themselves in their rooms and
start asking out loud, “Why did my best friend leave today?” Who are they
talking to? God, of course. This is common in both religious and non-religious
families. Even people who will openly say that they do not believe in God find
themselves talking to “someone in the room with them.” Our bones and our flesh
remember their creator. Prayer is our natural state!

Okay, Jesus
is going to teach them how to pray! The first thing he does is he praises God.
That is the first “P” of the four in this sermon. We start our prayers with
praise. It is not a kind of praise that sounds like flattery. It is praise that
shows honor and respect. God is called “Abba,” or Father. And, this father has
been made holy. God has a holy name.

I know that
in the last few decades, some have tried to take away the gender specific
“Father” out of prayer. If it helps anyone at all, the term in the Greek is not
so gender specific at all. Almost better to translate this as “parent.” The
important thing to note is the closeness of relationship that is being implied
by the term “Father.” To pray, we come into relationship once more with God.

The next
“P” comes right away in the text: Petition or Providence. You can choose
whichever one you like. Simply put, you are asking God for something to be
provided in your life.

The number
one thing on Jesus’ list would seem to be that God send down the Kingdom. Too
often we trap ourselves in prayer by praying for all of the little things. This
last week, for instance, I have struggled with a cold, and I lost my voice.
That happened on Monday, Helen’s birthday, and was my gift to her! Yet, I
prayed that my voice would come back for Tuesday’s Bible Studies. It did. If I
had prayed instead for God’s Kingdom to come, then I would have my new voice in
heaven already! I just prayed too small! Those who stand next to me in the
choir will confirm that my voice today could be called anything but heavenly.

This is
also a reminder to us not to get caught up in the political intrigues of the
daily news cycles. When you hear all this stuff, that you can really do nothing
immediately about anyway, start praying for God’s supreme intervention.

Although we
need to pray for the big things, Jesus also says that in terms of our daily
needs, pray for the small things. Please do not ask God for the Mercedes
Benz—you cannot get decent service on this island anyway! Just pray for your
daily bread. If you do not like eating bread, then pray for your daily tortilla
or your daily rice. And, that is really what the word “artos” that is here in
the Greek means. Some older versions of the Bible might even use the word
“staff” instead of “bread.” We do not use the term “staff of life” so much
anymore in the vernacular.

As we were
missionaries in Thailand, we learned how important it was to stick to the
original meaning of the text and not the cultural overlay we get in English
translations. The Thai eat rice, not bread. Even when you greet someone in the
street, you do not say “how are you?” but rather “Have you eaten rice yet?” If
you feed a Thai person pizza and hamburgers, they will come right back at you asking
for rice. Every meal is only a meal because it has rice. So, in Thailand you
pray for your daily rice!

God will
provide. Pray for it and God will provide for your life. The answer to your
prayer may not be exactly what you thought it should be, but God knows what you
need.

One of
those things that apparently God knows that we need, but we might not generally
keep at the top of our “to do” list is forgiveness. This is now the third “P”
today: Penitence. When we pray, we ask God to forgive us of our sins. We ask
for our daily bread at the same time we ask to be forgiven of our daily sin.

It is
interesting to note the order of these two lines in the prayer. It seems quite
clear that we must first attain the forgiveness from God before we are able to
forgive others. Did you notice that? First we pray for the forgiveness from
God, then we go ahead and forgive others as we have been forgiven.

Too often I
have heard this reversed, even though it seems perfectly clear. I have heard
others say that we must forgive others so that God can forgive us. It seems
here that the reverse is being said: we should ask to be forgiven by God so
that knowing what it means to gain forgiveness ourselves, we are then able to
offer this same forgiveness to others.

To put this
in other words, when we offer forgiveness to others, it really should be God’s
forgiveness over their lives that we are offering. I know that I can forgive
others whatever hurt they have caused me, but does God forgive them? What good
is my forgiveness over their lives if they do not know of God’s forgiveness in
heaven?!

Believe it
or not, I cannot take your sins away. The only person who can do that is Jesus
when he died on the cross. So, really the best that I, or anyone for that
matter can do, is ask you to ask God for the forgiveness of your sins. So, yes,
even though I might personally forgive someone else, I would rather follow that
up with helping that person be totally forgiven by God in heaven for this is
the salvation that we have through Jesus Christ. We call this act “penitence.”

The fourth
“P” in the sermon comes out of what Jesus says right after the words of the
prayer. Jesus goes on to talk about “perseverance.” Just to recapitulate: we
have in prayer “Praise, Petition, Penitence, and Perseverance.”

Jesus tells
this story of the man who runs to his neighbor in the middle of the night and
pounds on the door to ask for the loaves of bread that were baked that day in
the communal oven because he has a guest in his house who had come unexpectedly.
Why does the neighbor eventually open the door and give the bread away? The
word in the bible I grew up with was always “importunity.” Again, a word that
is no longer in the vernacular. “Anadeien” in the Greek can be translated as
“pestering,” “annoying,” and “exasperating.”

After all,
what parent will not want to give their child what that child is pestering them
for? This leads us back to the closeness of the relationship that we have with
God. Our prayer time is about being with God again. If you need something, and
you know that God is close by, then keep on asking for this thing. This is the
prayer of importunity or persistence. Never stop pestering God. If you want to
remember the fourth “p” as “pestering,” I think that is okay.

Praise God!
Petition God! Be penitent with God! And keep on pestering God in prayer! Jesus
says, that if you knock, the door will be opened. If you search, youshall find. If you are not knocking on God’s
door, if you are not searching out God in prayer, then you are missing the
closeness you can have with God. You are missing the Garden of Eden. You are
missing the promise of heaven.